Deck the Daleks
by imnotokaywiththerunning
Summary: The Doctor's made some festive improvements to Ace's trusty baseball bat. A Classic Who Secret Santa story.


**A/N This is my gift for ettelwenailinon for this year's Classic Who Secret Santa. They asked for "Ace with her bat or exploding things."  
Merry Christmas! Hope you enjoy it!**

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 **Deck the Daleks**

"Professor?"Ace called walking into the TARDIS console room. "Have you seen my baseball bat?"

"Just here, Ace."

The Doctor was bent over the console and casually handed Ace her missing bat. She looked at it warily. "Why did you have it? I thought I'd left it in my room?"

The Doctor waved his hand dismissively. "Oh, I just made a few improvements. For Christmas."

Ace hefted the bat in her hand. It didn't feel any different. It didn't look any different either. She shrugged and placed it into her backpack along with some canisters of Nitro-9. "So what's the plan for today, Professor?"

The Doctor finally looked up from the console and smiled mischievously. "I thought we'd pay a visit to some old friends of mine." The TARDIS wheezed to a stop. "I think we'll have fun."

"What kind of friends?" Ace asked slinging her pack onto her back. The Doctor's idea of friends wasn't always her idea of friends.

The Doctor merely smiled, donned his hat and hooked his question mark umbrella over his arm. He opened the TARDIS doors and gestured for Ace to follow, "Shall we?"

 **Fifteen Minutes Later…**

"ACE!"

Ace barrelled down the hallway towards the Doctor's panicked cry. Sure enough the Doctor's "friends" hadn't been friends at all. She wasn't surprised, really. If there was ever a day when she and the Doctor didn't find some kind of trouble, Ace would pack it all in. Where would be the fun in a normal, quiet life?

"ACE!"

Ace picked up the pace and pulled her baseball bat from her backpack. Her boots pounded against the concrete floor jarring her bones. She reached the corner where she thought she'd heard the Doctor. She gripped her bat tight and jumped around the corner ready to deck whatever monster the Doctor was faced with now.

"EX-TER-MIN-ATE!"

The Doctor was crouched behind a large pallet of piping surrounded by three daleks. The daleks were focused solely on the Doctor and didn't notice Ace coming up behind them. Ace clinched her teeth and took a hard swing at the dalek closest to her. Her bat flew through the air in a graceful arc and landed squarely on the dalek's domed top. The resulting clang wasn't so much a clang as a tinkling bell. A bright flash of light accompanied the bells and right before her eyes, the drab gray dalek turned bright red covered in shining golden globes. Even the lights on top of its dome started flashing green and read. It turned and pointed its gun blaster toward the wall.

"DEC-OR-ATE!" Red tinsel spouted from its gun sticking to the walls haphazardly.

Ace looked at her bat in confusion. "What the-"

"Ace, there's two more!"

The Doctor's cry brought her out of her confusion and she swung again connecting with the next dalek with another tinkling sound. She side-stepped around it to dodge a blast from the last one moving rapidly towards her. She planted her feet in a perfect batter's stance and let loose on the final dalek sending it skidding across the hall to bounce off the wall. This last one turned green instead of red. And it was singing... Christmas carols?

"Well done, Ace!" The Doctor said popping up beside her. He was beaming with pride at the three daleks now intent on spewing Christmas cheer instead of trying to exterminate everything in their paths. Ace eyed him in disbelief and held up her bat.

"A few improvements for Christmas?"

The Doctor laughed and twirled his umbrella in his hand. "Yes! Good ones, too!" He frowned speculatively at the newly turned Christmas daleks. "Do you think they do TARDIS's?"

Ace groaned. "Professor!"

The Doctor grinned and then turned grandly to the daleks. "Daleks! What would you say to helping us decorate our TARDIS?"

He was met with a chorus of "DEC-OR-ATE! DEC-OR-ATE! DEC-OR-ATE!"

"Excellent!" The Doctor exclaimed clapping his hands together in glee. "Come on then, Ace."

Ace watched as the Doctor marched down the hallway followed by three festive daleks all chanting, "JIN-GLE BELLS! JIN-GLE BELLS! JIN-GLE BELLS!" Ace rolled her eyes and followed along, too.

 **Deck the TARDIS**

"It looks like an elf's puked in here," Ace complained. The normally white interior of the TARDIS was covered floor to ceiling in every type of Christmas decoration imaginable and some not-so-imaginable. She poked gingerly at what looked like a giant bogie hanging from a garland.

"Ace," the Doctor sighed. "Where's your Christmas spirit? I think it looks wonderful." He smiled at the daleks now placing ornaments on a Christmas tree. "Our dalek friends have done an amazing job."

Ace wrinkled her nose. The Doctor was crazy. "You know what I don't understand? What kind of improvements did you make to my bat exactly to turn daleks into Christmas elves?"

"Oh this and that," the Doctor hedged. "You know, science and what not."

Ace squinted in suspicion. "Science? What kind of science?"

The Doctor sighed once again. "Ace, it's Christmas. Can't you believe in the magic of Christmas just this once?" He smiled hopefully at her.

"Fine," Ace said shrugging. "I believe in the magic of Christmas."

The Doctor beamed at her. "Excellent! Daleks! I think it's time for some Christmas carols. What do you say, Ace?"

Ace groaned and covered her face with her hands while the Doctor began to lead a dalek chorus of "Deck the Halls."


End file.
